


to-morrow

by damientiamat



Category: Twelfth Night - Shakespeare
Genre: Alternate Ending, Genderfluid Character, M/M, Other, Post-Canon Fix-It, Sibling Banter, Trans Character, abuse of shakespearean english probably, and who do you even contact to proofread your 17th century dialogue, as is. probably obvious from the relationship tags, basically its referenced that act 5 went somewhat differently, im pretty sure i did my research at the time but im not an expert, non-binary viola/cesario, olivia/cesario local powercouple, sebastian opens a tavern, this is just gay trans content about siblings supporting each other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-07
Updated: 2019-10-07
Packaged: 2020-11-26 16:58:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,390
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20933624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/damientiamat/pseuds/damientiamat
Summary: Evasion having failed him, Sebastian chooses each utterance as a careful footstep through a pack of sleeping wolves. “Should Antonio feel as thou claimest, he will surely declare his intent in his own time. ‘Tis not a gentleman’s right to use encouraging hearsay as excuse for hurtful behaviours.”“Should Antonio- should he!” Cesario rears up incensed from his seat at this. Sebastian has stepped on a tail, he thinks as he sees incisors bared.





	to-morrow

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written in August 2017 for the modern Shakespeare zine _such stuff as dreams are made of_ , scavenging a cohesive narrative from my buckets of Twelfth Night opinions.
> 
> Some brief notes that don't really get expanded on in this fic:  
1\. Cesario exists as a legal identity, since Viola got hired and paid as 'Cesario' on Orsino's ledger, and therefore you could argue that Sebastian was acting as a stand-in for Cesario at the wedding. The alternate Act 5 in this narrative involved a whole blow-out argument about this.  
2\. Sebastian is opening a tavern because he enjoys sight-seeing and hearing stories and running a tavern lets him meet and talk to lots of new people.  
3\. Olivia has a substantial amount of political influence over Illyria. Antonio has been officially pardoned by Olivia and acts at least part-time as her foreign affairs advisor.
> 
> A huge thank you to natroze and owlinaminor for organizing the zine- this fic wouldn't exist without you.

When Cesario drums upon the barred door just past dusk, Sebastian cannot in good faith find a reason to ignore him and continue polishing. Instead, he grabs the broom behind the counter and comes forward to open his barricade. Sebastian plucks an elderly leaf from Viola’s messy tangle of hair as she strolls past, tossing it back to its home. He keeps his back to Cesario under the pretense of dusting away the dirt trail that leads to Cesario’s languid sprawl on a stool by the long wooden bar.

“How now, Sebastian?”

“My tavern is new, and requires maintenance to remain as such, whereas thy boots are surely eons old for the quantities of grime upon them.”

Viola huffs. “I speak of Antonio, my dear Sebastian.”

“Let me consider now- he was hither just yesterday, to instruct me on proper methods o’ waxing these counter tops; he told me today was one reserved for assisting thee and thy lady on some matters of legislations and trade customs with Messaline and the like, but he plans to return to-morrow with recommendations for local brewsters.”

Sebastian discovers sadly that there is no more dirt to sweep out, and sets about instead hauling the hefty oak beam back into place across the door as Cesario looks askance.

“Hast thou forgotten so soon the words I spoke to thee just last fortnight?”

Sebastian sorely can, like a poker to a fresh bruise, but he chooses instead to shrug and return the broom to its corner on the safer side of the counter in exchange for a polish rag. “The moment in which thou rejected Orsino’s hand, claimed sovereignty to both sexes and also to that marriage vow I did seal with Olivia under thy name?”

Viola’s brow drops. She uncrosses her legs and leans forward across the bar, flint brown eyes seeking contact with Sebastian’s deflected gaze.

“Playing the fool suits you poorly, brother. Thy ignorant dismissal of Antonio’s affections! All there could see ‘twas truth. Why hast thou done nothing? He was miserable as a spurned hound all today’s meeting.”

Evasion having failed him, Sebastian chooses each utterance as a careful footstep through a pack of sleeping wolves. “Should Antonio feel as thou claimest, he will surely declare his intent in his own time. ‘Tis not a gentleman’s right to use encouraging hearsay as excuse for hurtful behaviours.”

“Should Antonio- should he!” Cesario rears up incensed from his seat at this. Sebastian has stepped on a tail, he thinks as he sees incisors bared.

“Aye, Antonio ‘feels as I claim’, and also shame! And also rejection! He sees thy silence as dismissal! He was the one whose tender and bruising heart I laid bare, which was my foolish error- I thought I could remove all possible excuse from thy person and hasten thine actions, but I see now I should have revealed thy coy delays and cowardly defenses as the liverless hesitations of a milksop instead!”

Exasperated, Sebastian throws his hands into the air, waxing cloth nearly lost to the rafters but for a thumb and forefinger’s grip. “As though thou hast behaved any better, o Cesario, swaggering in and demanding marriage! Thou couldst not simply go with he whom thou didst love, nay, rather displace all affairs present and then some!”

“I could not survive as a liar to myself, brother, I would rather be hanged!” Viola slams her hands down onto the counter, breaking the argument with a resounding crack.

A silence weighs heavy between them. Cesario’s face is flushed vivid with upset, chest heaving beneath his jacket, gaze unfocused on the smooth wood grain of the bar. Sebastian finds his arms to be akimbo and tucks them back in, loosens the collar of his overshirt. Places the polish cloth upon the counter. Revisits his own words in his head, and winces.

“I have wronged thee,” he admits. “I would never wish for my kin to bear the weight of a false integrity in my place.”

Viola’s shoulders sag as she slumps back into her chair and barks a short laugh. “Nor the weight of a false manhood, either, I’d wager.”

Sebastian snorts, relaxes. “I’ve certainly no desire for false womanhood for myself,” he jokes, gesturing at his breast.

Another moment pauses, lighter, catching its breath. Sebastian is more hesitant to break this silence, unable to find a safe diversion from Cesario’s focused needling. He starts when Cesario speaks first.

“I understand the honour in holding thy tongue for another’s comfort, Sebastian. I have certainly done the same.” Viola sighs. “But how canst thou expect Antonio to speak when all his words have already been said; when his actions continue to speak? Thy silence acts as no comfort, here, only disregard.”

Sebastian is tired, suddenly. He recites the words that stick fast to the inside of his skull despite two weeks and his best drink. “Sebastian, dear brother, I’ve words for thee. To discard so easily one honest love for another misled! Thy dear Antonio, who hast shown nothing but devotion for thine open naivety; saved, fed, and indulged thee; stepped forward and drawn steel to bear thy faults and defend thine honor.”

“So thou hast not forgotten.”

He slumps against the counter, resting his forehead against the cool wood. It is smoother now, sanded down and waxed as Antonio had shown him how, rubbing the cloth in slow circles before following the wood grain; flicking tiny balls of wax at each other while waiting for the counter to dry before Antonio could demonstrate the buffing process. Even the wood brings Antonio to mind!

“How could I?”

Sebastian can hear it in his brother’s voice when he softens, melts, tender hearted as ever. “Oh, Sebastian.” Sebastian feels his hand taken up, clasped gently to Cesario’s breast. A wayward thumb strokes across the back of his hand, just brushing the cuff of his overshirt.

“I know ‘tis difficult to begin, but the reward for a strong liver here will surely be worth thy pains.”

“Antonio is- he is his own man, Cesario.”

The thumb stills, before resuming its path across his knuckles.

“Aye, and he loves thee now, by his own word. Trust in that.”

Sebastian feels pathetic, face down on the bar without even a drink, and props himself upon his free elbow to better regard his twin. “How didst thou manage it so easily? Declare your intentions to the lady Olivia?”

Viola exhales a laugh, squeezes his hand gently. “Ah, therein lies thy mistake: I did not. I found no ease, being so revealed as I was. I found hope in my lady’s past exultations, yea; but hope carries no ease, only heightened tensions. ‘Tis always a struggle, brother, but thou must be willing to take the risk for him as he has for thee; else be undeserving of his open affections. To speak candidly and respectfully is no sin, so long as one listens in turn.”

Sebastian grasps onto that thread, for Antonio. Tell Antonio for Antonio. A gift of love and veneration, rather than a demand for possession and sacrifice. He can feel the tension slowly dripping out his spine, and when Cesario takes a thumb to the furrows of his forehead, he is surprised to feel the invisible relief of too-long-tensed muscles finally relaxed. The understanding must be seeping into his eyes, displacing his ugly melancholy, because Cesario finally returns Sebastian’s hand and nods approvingly.

“Antonio is coming to-morrow with some local brews, aye?”

Sebastian squints at her. “Aye. Wherefore?”

“When he does come here, do also tell him to come hither, ah?” Viola devolves into uproarious snorts as Sebastian floods a bright scarlet beneath his sandy complexion and bats at her shoulders.

“Out, out! Out of my tavern! Shoo, lech! I’ll have none of this in my honest abode!”

Cesario obligingly backpedals towards the door, still hiccuping with pleased laughter as Sebastian follows to help heft the oaken bar off its prongs and shoo him back towards his own estate. Rebarring the door once more, Sebastian can’t help but raise a hand to feel the heat off his cheeks. A brief fantasy of grabbing his jacket and seeking out Antonio posthaste runs through his mind before he dismisses it, wandering upstairs to the echo of an old advice.

“To-morrow, sir: best first go see your lodging.”


End file.
